The United States Civil War was the first major American conflict recorded with photography. Photography dimmed the sense of glory and heroism often associated with war, giving American citizens a jarring but real idea of the horrors of war. Thousands of photographs were produced from 1861 to 1865, both for governmental and individual use. These, for the most part, depicted figures of authority (both military and political), other military personnel, weapons, military equipment, locations of campgrounds and battles, and the aftermath of battles. At the time, the most popular method of photography wet plate collodion photography. This method required five to twenty seconds of exposure for each negative, which made it hard to take pictures of battles and other military action. With the help of portable darkrooms, however, a few battle shots were produced and preserved. The video above is a slideshow of Civil War Period snapshots, courtesy of www.videohistorytoday. com via Youtube.
Taking Photographs During the Civil War
Taking photographs during the Civil War was a long, complex process. In most cases it required two photographers. The first photographer would mix the necessary chemicals, consisting largely of collodion, and pour them onto a clean glass plate. Each plate had to be handled with great care, a difficult task on the
A plate glass image being developed
battlefield. After the chemicals had been given time to evaporate, the plate would be submerged in a silver nitrate bath solution in a darkroom to further sensitize it to light. This plate was put into a light-tight wet plate holder, which was then put into the camera.The second photographer would set up, position, and focus the camera while this was happening. Once the photograph had been taken, the cap would taken off the lens to expose it to light and imprint the image on the wet plate. Exposure had to be completed within minutes, sometimes seconds, after which the plate was rushed to the portable darkroom. There it was developed in a solution of pyrogallic acid (an acid extracted from gallic acid, an acid obtained from tree bark). A mixture of sodium thiosulfate was added to prevent the image from fading. The plate was then varnished to provide protection for its surface.
Mathew Brady
Mathew Brady is considered one of the most important, if not the most important photographer of the Civil War. He and his employees - which included figures such as Alexander Gardner and Timothy O'Sullivan - were the first to take photography onto the battlefield, often recording battles under fire. Brady's photographs
Mathew Brady in 1861
are valued pieces among photograph collectors.
Mathew Brady arrived in New York City at the age of sixteen. He started his own small business manufacturing jewelry cases, studying photography in his spare time under the guidance of multiple instructors, including Samuel Morse, the man considered largely responsible for bringing photography to America. Brady discovered a natural talent for photography and established his own studio in 1844. By the time he moved his studio to Washington, D.C. in 1856, he was considered one of the nation's finest photographers; his reason for moving to Washington in the first place was to make photographing the country's leaders more convenient. He felt himself "as under obligation to my country to preserve the faces of its historic men and mothers." He became one of the first photographers to use his craft to record history. Towards the beginning of the Civil War he departed a successful career as a portrait photographer and put together a crew to photograph the war. Many of the photographs from that period attributed to him were not taken by him but by members of his crew or other photographers who sold him their photographs. He was more of a project manager than anything else, and in 1862 he displayed his collection, entitled "The Dead of Antietam", in his New York gallery. The exhibit gave many Americans their first view into the horrors of war. The New York Times wrote that it "brought home to us the terrible reality and earnestness of war."
Timothy O'Sullivanand Alexander Gardner
Timothy O'Sullivan and Alexander Gardner were two driving forces in 19th Century photography. During the Civil War they were both members of the corps employed by Mathew Brady to take pictures on the battlefield. Both had successful individual careers, especially after their period under Brady's employ.
Timothy O'Sullivan was born in New York City in 1840. O'Sullivan entered Brady's employ in as a young man Washington while serving as Gardner's apprentice. O'Sullivan was working in Brady's studio when the Civil War began, and the demand for individual photographs soared. Multiple Union soldiers wanted their picture taken before they went off to war. George Custer, Joseph Hooker, George McClellan, and William Sherman were all photographed at the Brady studio. In July of 1861 Brady traveled to
Timothy O'Sullivan's Harvest of Death
see the Battle of Bull Run. Upon his return he sent O'Sullivan, Gardner, and twenty others to chronicle the war with the art of photography. It was on this expedition that O'Sullivan produced his famous Harvest of Death, a depiction of dead soldiers at Gettysburg. Displeased with Brady's policy of taking credit for photographs taken by his employees, O'Sullivan left Brady's employ to start his own photography business. He died of tuberculosis in 1882, two years after being appointed chief photographer of the Department of the Treasury.
Alexander Gardner was born in Paisley, Scotland in 1821. After moving to Glasgow Gardner left school at the age of fourteen to become an apprentice jeweler. In 1851, Gardner visited the Great Exhibition in Hyde Park, UK, where he saw Brady's photographs for the first time. He began experimenting with photography soon after. Gardner and his family emigrated to the US in 1856, eventually settling in New York. Gardner found work as a photographer with Brady soon after. He specialized in what was known as Imperial photographs (17 x 20 inches). These became very popular among consumers. Brady could sell them for $50 to $750 each, depending on how much they needed to be touched up. As Brady's eyesight deteriorated during the 1850's, he began to rely more and more on Gardner to run the business. In 1858 he was put in charge of Brady's studio in Washington,where he trained Timothy O'Sullivan and earned a reputation as an excellent portrait photographer. In 1861 Gardner was sent out along with O'Sullivan and others to photograph events in the Civil War. During this project he shot his famous President Lincoln on the Battlefield of Antietam. In 1861 he was appointed an honorary captain of General McClellan's staff and photographed the battles of Antietam, Fredericksburg, Gettsyburg, and the siege of Petersburg. After the war Gardner established his own studio in Washington. He died there in 1882.
George S. Cook (Jeremiah)
George S. Cook, born in Stratford, Connecticut in 1819, was a well-known photographer of the Confederacy during the Civil War. At twenty years of age, while he was studying painting in New Orleans, photography was introduced in America.
George S. Cook
He immediately embraced the new mechanism and, until he settled down in 1849, helped to expand the popularity of photography throughout the South. Initially, he managed a gallery in New Orleans, but soon later, he set out to teach the art to people in small, inland, southern towns. In each town, he would establish a studio to teach a few students, then sell the business to the most progressive student. Cook settled in Charleston, South Carolina in the late 1940's, to raise a family. During the Civil War, he became famous for recording the gradual deterioration of Charleston and Fort Sumter. When his family moved to Richmond in 1880, his older son, George LaGrange Cook, took over his studio in Charleston.On top of his active studio, Cook bought the businesses of other Richmond photographers who were retiring or moving. In doing so, he assembled the most complete collection of photographs of Richmond in one studio. George Cook remained a photographer all his life. During the 1880s, his son, Huestis, took interest in photography and later went into business with his father. Following George's death in 1902, Huestis took over the Richmond studio.
Cameras & Equipment
Stereo view placed three-dimensional viewer
Photography equipment and tools were primitive during the Civil War. Battlefield photographers such as Brady had to drag along an extra wagon that housed a darkroom (pictured below) for every expedition they made. Cameras were large, clumsy objects. The most common method of photography at the time was based on the use of a wet plate (see Taking Photographs During the Civil War).
John Coffer's Reproduction Portable Darkroom for Wetplate Use
Finished plates were called plate glass negatives. These would often be printed on paper that could be framed and/or mounted. A popular item among consumers at the time was three-dimensional images called "stereo views". These were made using a twin-lens camera that captured the image from two separate lenses, much in the way each eye of a person sees an object at a slightly different angle. These cameras also used wet plates; the image was duplicated on one plate. The duplicate images were printed onto a stereoview card that was placed in a handheld viewer. The viewer made the image appear three-dimensional to the viewer.
Photography Through Time
Experiments involving image capture date back to ancient times, when the "camera obscura" was used to display images on walls in darkened rooms.
Camera Obscura
Pictures of various types were placed in boxes similar to the one to the right. At the opposite of the box was a pinhole, and if the pinhole was small enough, the image was reflected, upside down, on the opposite wall. The camera obscura was used and developed until the 19th century, when Nicéphore Niépce inserted photosensitive paper into the camera obscura, obtaining a permanent picture in 1826. In 1837 French artist and chemist Louis Daguerre invented what would later be known as the Daguerreotype process: he created images on silver-plated copper, coated it with silver iodide, and developed the image with warm mercury. Daguerre's images, however, required several minutes of exposure, which made it impossible to photograph people and objects in motion. In 1851, English sculptor Frederick Scott Archer improved photographic resolution by spreading collodion and other chemicals on a sheet of glass. Wet plate photography was cheaper and provided for unlimited reproductions. This was the method used by Mathew Brady and his colleagues during the Civil War. Click here to see a timeline marking the most important milestones of the progression of photography methods.
John Coffer's Reproduction Portable Darkroom for Wetplate Use. Photograph. Civil War Photography: A Web Resource for Civil War Photography. By R. J. Szabo. Web. 7 May 2011. <http://www.cwreenactors.com/collodion/darkroom3.htm>
Table of Contents
The United States Civil War was the first major American conflict recorded with photography. Photography dimmed the sense of glory and heroism often associated with war, giving American citizens a jarring but real idea of the horrors of war. Thousands of photographs were produced from 1861 to 1865, both for governmental and individual use. These, for the most part, depicted figures of authority (both military and political), other military personnel, weapons, military equipment, locations of campgrounds and battles, and the aftermath of battles. At the time, the most popular method of photography wet plate collodion photography. This method required five to twenty seconds of exposure for each negative, which made it hard to take pictures of battles and other military action. With the help of portable darkrooms, however, a few battle shots were produced and preserved. The video above is a slideshow of Civil War Period snapshots, courtesy of www.videohistorytoday. com via Youtube.Taking Photographs During the Civil War
Taking photographs during the Civil War was a long, complex process. In most cases it required two photographers. The first photographer would mix the necessary chemicals, consisting largely of collodion, and pour them onto a clean glass plate. Each plate had to be handled with great care, a difficult task on thebattlefield. After the chemicals had been given time to evaporate, the plate would be submerged in a silver nitrate bath solution in a darkroom to further sensitize it to light. This plate was put into a light-tight wet plate holder, which was then put into the camera.The second photographer would set up, position, and focus the camera while this was happening. Once the photograph had been taken, the cap would taken off the lens to expose it to light and imprint the image on the wet plate. Exposure had to be completed within minutes, sometimes seconds, after which the plate was rushed to the portable darkroom. There it was developed in a solution of pyrogallic acid (an acid extracted from gallic acid, an acid obtained from tree bark). A mixture of sodium thiosulfate was added to prevent the image from fading. The plate was then varnished to provide protection for its surface.
Mathew Brady
Mathew Brady is considered one of the most important, if not the most important photographer of the Civil War. He and his employees - which included figures such as Alexander Gardner and Timothy O'Sullivan - were the first to take photography onto the battlefield, often recording battles under fire. Brady's photographsMathew Brady arrived in New York City at the age of sixteen. He started his own small business manufacturing jewelry cases, studying photography in his spare time under the guidance of multiple instructors, including Samuel Morse, the man considered largely responsible for bringing photography to America. Brady discovered a natural talent for photography and established his own studio in 1844. By the time he moved his studio to Washington, D.C. in 1856, he was considered one of the nation's finest photographers; his reason for moving to Washington in the first place was to make photographing the country's leaders more convenient. He felt himself "as under obligation to my country to preserve the faces of its historic men and mothers." He became one of the first photographers to use his craft to record history. Towards the beginning of the Civil War he departed a successful career as a portrait photographer and put together a crew to photograph the war. Many of the photographs from that period attributed to him were not taken by him but by members of his crew or other photographers who sold him their photographs. He was more of a project manager than anything else, and in 1862 he displayed his collection, entitled "The Dead of Antietam", in his New York gallery. The exhibit gave many Americans their first view into the horrors of war. The New York Times wrote that it "brought home to us the terrible reality and earnestness of war."
Timothy O'Sullivan and Alexander Gardner
Timothy O'Sullivan and Alexander Gardner were two driving forces in 19th Century photography. During the Civil War they were both members of the corps employed by Mathew Brady to take pictures on the battlefield. Both had successful individual careers, especially after their period under Brady's employ.
Timothy O'Sullivan was born in New York City in 1840. O'Sullivan entered Brady's employ in as a young man Washington while serving as Gardner's apprentice. O'Sullivan was working in Brady's studio when the Civil War began, and the demand for individual photographs soared. Multiple Union soldiers wanted their picture taken before they went off to war. George Custer, Joseph Hooker, George McClellan, and William Sherman were all photographed at the Brady studio. In July of 1861 Brady traveled to
Alexander Gardner was born in Paisley, Scotland in 1821. After moving to Glasgow Gardner left school at the age of fourteen to become an apprentice jeweler. In 1851, Gardner visited the Great Exhibition in Hyde Park, UK, where he saw Brady's photographs for the first time. He began experimenting with photography soon after. Gardner and his family emigrated to the US in 1856, eventually settling in New York. Gardner found work as a photographer with Brady soon after. He specialized in what was known as Imperial photographs (17 x 20 inches). These became very popular among consumers. Brady could sell them for $50 to $750 each, depending on how much they needed to be touched up. As Brady's eyesight deteriorated during the 1850's, he began to rely more and more on Gardner to run the business. In 1858 he was put in charge of Brady's studio in Washington,where he trained Timothy O'Sullivan and earned a reputation as an excellent portrait photographer. In 1861 Gardner was sent out along with O'Sullivan and others to photograph events in the Civil War. During this project he shot his famous President Lincoln on the Battlefield of Antietam. In 1861 he was appointed an honorary captain of General McClellan's staff and photographed the battles of Antietam, Fredericksburg, Gettsyburg, and the siege of Petersburg. After the war Gardner established his own studio in Washington. He died there in 1882.
George S. Cook (Jeremiah)
George S. Cook, born in Stratford, Connecticut in 1819, was a well-known photographer of the Confederacy during the Civil War. At twenty years of age, while he was studying painting in New Orleans, photography was introduced in America.Cameras & Equipment
Photography equipment and tools were primitive during the Civil War. Battlefield photographers such as Brady had to drag along an extra wagon that housed a darkroom (pictured below) for every expedition they made. Cameras were large, clumsy objects. The most common method of photography at the time was based on the use of a wet plate (see Taking Photographs During the Civil War).
Finished plates were called plate glass negatives. These would often be printed on paper that could be framed and/or mounted.
A popular item among consumers at the time was three-dimensional images called "stereo views". These were made using a twin-lens camera that captured the image from two separate lenses, much in the way each eye of a person sees an object at a slightly different angle. These cameras also used wet plates; the image was duplicated on one plate. The duplicate images were printed onto a stereoview card that was placed in a handheld viewer. The viewer made the image appear three-dimensional to the viewer.
Photography Through Time
Experiments involving image capture date back to ancient times, when the "camera obscura" was used to display images on walls in darkened rooms.Pictures of various types were placed in boxes similar to the one to the right. At the opposite of the box was a pinhole, and if the pinhole was small enough, the image was reflected, upside down, on the opposite wall. The camera obscura was used and developed until the 19th century, when Nicéphore Niépce inserted photosensitive paper into the camera obscura, obtaining a permanent picture in 1826. In 1837 French artist and chemist Louis Daguerre invented what would later be known as the Daguerreotype process: he created images on silver-plated copper, coated it with silver iodide, and developed the image with warm mercury. Daguerre's images, however, required several minutes of exposure, which made it impossible to photograph people and objects in motion. In 1851, English sculptor Frederick Scott Archer improved photographic resolution by spreading collodion and other chemicals on a sheet of glass. Wet plate photography was cheaper and provided for unlimited reproductions. This was the method used by Mathew Brady and his colleagues during the Civil War.
Click here to see a timeline marking the most important milestones of the progression of photography methods.
civil war photography notes (2).doc
Bibliography
Information
Greenspun, Philip. "History of Photography Timeline." Photo.net. Namamedia, Inc., Jan. 2007. Web. 16 May 2011. <http://photo.net/history/timeline>
"History of Photography." National Geographic. National Geographic Society, 2009. Web. 19 May 2011. <http://photography.nationalgeographic.com/photography/photographers/photography-timeline.html>
Leggat, Robert. "Camera Obscura." 23 Sept. 2008. Web. 19 May 2011. <http://www.rleggat.com/photohistory/history/cameraob.htm>
Meredith, Roy. "Introduction." Introduction. Mr. Lincoln's Camera Man: Mathew B. Brady. Second ed. New York: Dover Publications, 1974. Vii-iii. Print.
"Photography and the Civil War." Civilwar.org. Civil War Trust. Web. 7 May 2011. <http://www.civilwar.org/photos/3d-photography-special/photography-and-the- civil-war.html>.
"Pyrogallol." Encyclopedia Britannica: Eb.com. Encyclopedia Britannica, 2011. Web. 17 May 2011. <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/484959/pyrogallol>
Simkin, John. Alexander Gardner. Spartacus Educational. Web. 19 May 2011. <http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAPgardner.htm>
Simkin, John. Timothy O'Sullivan. Spartacus Educational. Web. 19 May 2011. <http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAPosullivan.htm>
United States. The Library of Congress. American Memory. 22 Sept. 1997. Web. 15 May 2011. <http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/cwphtml/cwbrady.html>.
United States. The Library of Congress. American Memory. 22 Sept. 1997. Web. 8 May 2011. <http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/cwphtml/cwtake.html>.
United States. The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration. National Archives and Records Administration. Web. 7 May 2011 <http://www.archives.gov/research/military/civil-war/photos/index.html>.
"Through the Lens of Time." VCU Libraries Digital Collections | Home. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 May 2011.
<http://dig.library.vcu.edu/cdm4/index_cook.php?CISOROOT=/cook>.
Video
American Civil War Photographs. Youtube.com. Video History Today, 22 Jan. 2008. Web. 16 May 2011. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImxekZIWyh4>
Pictures
The Camera Record. Photograph. Camp Nelson, Jessamine County, KY. Camp Nelson: Civil War Heritage Park. Web. 15 May 2011. <http://www.campnelson.org/tour/photography.htm>.
All other pictures taken from Wikicommons
John Coffer's Reproduction Portable Darkroom for Wetplate Use. Photograph. Civil War Photography: A Web Resource for Civil War Photography. By R. J. Szabo. Web. 7 May 2011. <http://www.cwreenactors.com/collodion/darkroom3.htm>